Hindrocket compares the fake CBS document scandal to our perception of airplan hijackers pre-9/11. I think it is an apt comparison. We make many assumptions every day, most of the time without due consideration.
The fact that CBS was willing to barter away what remained of its reputation in exchange for an opportunity to help the John Kerry campaign requires us to re-examine our assumptions about the mainstream media, just as the emergence of the suicide bomber required us to re-examine certain assumptions about security. We never thought that a vast, powerful broadcast network would destroy its own reputation for political gain. Now we know that it can happen.
News bias has always existed. It is actually healthy. Competition drives people to perform. People with talent, that it. Kinda makes me wonder about the talent at places like CBS, AP, NBC, and Reuters. FoxNews, eager to be #1, have upset the applecart. And the old league are faltering. They cannot deal with competition. So they resort to inventing stories which have pizzazz.
And playing a role in an election has always suited media. Being the vanguard for a campaign, however, has always been a role filled by newspapers, not television. Especially not major news organizations. Is there a paradigm shift (I always hated that phrase), as Hindrocket suggests?
Jay Rosen, another whose opinion I seek on issues of media, has interesting observations, but does not yet draw any conclusions regarding the outcome of all this as regards credibility. And, as always, the commenters add to the dialog.
Why has CBS News acted more like a politician responding to criticism than a news organization after the truth?
I decided to see if our local CBS affiliate cared to take a stand.
I have been following the story of Dan Rather’s fake documents this week, and am concerned that your credibility will take a hit along with his. Jim Lago and I have discussed the research power of the internet, and how easily the memos were debunked within hours by people familiar with all facets of the documents from typesetting to personal experience with various typewriters. Doesn’t CBS have the same capability?
It is time for Dan Rather to prove his documents are real. They’ve already been shown not to be, but he insists they are. In a court of law, the case would have been thrown out post haste. Perhaps your station, and all other CBS affiliates can put the pressure on to make things right, one way or the other.
I’ll let you know if I get a response.
It’s interesting, isn’t it? Bloggers often credit themselves for having taken down Trent Lott from the Majority Leader position in the Senate. That was always a defensible but questionable position. Still, bloggers claimed Lott’s scalp, whether they fully deserved it or not.
I do not think that anyone can deny, at all, that the Rathergate story can credibly be credited to bloggers, and no one but bloggers.
Now the big question: will the story subside and die? Or will bloggers finally be able to say, “Yes, we changed the world?”
We’ll see. I’m betting on the bloggers, but then I am one so I am hardly objective.
Comment by Dean Esmay — September 12, 2004 @ 7:42 am
Again I think your letter will go straight into the “circular-file”. Television and radio stations only care about “ratings”; because that is how they generate their “revenue”. Lets face it there are too many lazy people in this country that refuse to investigate for themselves, and will believe the commercial media. Having said that I do wish you good luck in getting CBS and the affiliate to notice.
Comment by Bubba Bo Bob Brain — September 12, 2004 @ 10:58 am
I think local affiliates are more responsive. I also added that little piece about mentioning it on Lago’s show as a bit of impetus to move. Nobody in any market wants to be outdone.
Comment by Bunker — September 12, 2004 @ 11:04 am
TV affiliates do care mostly about their ratings..and that’s why in one’s letters and emails to them it is stated that “I ain’t watchin’ your channel anymore”.
Comment by Wallace-Midland, Texas — September 12, 2004 @ 11:11 am